Under Attack

I felt the sickening weight in my stomach again.

He had only spent four days with me—the first four days I was alive—but his identity had never been a secret. The fact that he was tracking the Vessel of Souls, however, had.

“I don’t understand though,” I said, resting the journal on the table. “Mom was looking for someone normal when she found Lucas, someone who had nothing to do with the supernatural realm.”

Like my grandmother, my mother was a seer. But unlike my grandmother, my mother hated what she could do. She shut out her powers in any way she could—first with drugs and alcohol, and finally, with Lucas Szabo. The way Grandma told it, my mother and Lucas fell in love immediately. To Lucas, my mother was a classic beauty, a strong-willed woman who guarded her privacy and her serenity with everything she had. To my mother, Lucas Szabo was a stable man who wore cardigans rather than capes, who drove a sensible Ford Taurus and had a pantry full of cream of mushroom soup and Ovaltine rather than our standard eye of newt and freeze-dried bat. He taught mythological studies at the University of San Francisco, but rather than conjure or cohabitate with magicks, he debunked them. One by one Lucas went after the fake fortune tellers and mystics that pandered to the Pier 39 tourists. My mother thought his disdain for the mystical world was perfect and envisioned a future attending Junior League meetings and eating deviled egg sandwiches at Crissy Field. The perfect, normal family.

Nine months later I came along, and four days after that, Lucas Szabo disappeared.

Alex’s hand closed over mine and squeezed gently. His touch was comforting but did little to dispel the surge of emotions roiling through me.

“He left her because of me.”

“That’s not true, Lawson.”

I shook Alex’s hand off mine. “Yes, it is. Apparently, he was looking for a kid that had some powers. After four days of gurgling and sucking on my toes I wasn’t able to pull a rabbit out of my hat, so daddy dearest took off.”

“If he didn’t believe in any of the supernatural stuff, why would your lack of abilities be a problem?” Nina wanted to know.

I shrugged. “I don’t know. That’s just the way the story goes. I don’t know anything else about him. According to my grandmother, he never tried to contact me, not even after my mother died. He didn’t even come to her funeral.”

I felt a stab of pain mixed with the sting of anger. What kind of father abandons his child?

“Well, maybe there was something more to it,” Nina said hopefully. “The rest of these books are super old. Maybe that one is, too. Maybe—maybe your dad died. I mean, not that that’s necessarily a good thing but ... do you even know if he’s still alive?”

Nina and I both looked at Alex.

“What are you looking at me for?”

“Don’t you have some kind of, I don’t know, list of the dead?” Nina asked. “I mean, you know ...”

Alex frowned. “You’re dead, too. Do you have a list?”

Nina held up a finger. “Technically, I’m undead. You, my friend, are dead-dead. And we don’t deal in ghosts.”

Alex raised a challenging eyebrow. “I have a heartbeat. And a pulse. If anyone is dead here, it’s you. You’re way deader than I am. And we don’t deal with ghosts, either. We work strictly souls. Well, angels and souls.”

“Okay! Now that we know that everyone is dead—or undead—can we get back to this? Can we get back to searching for the Vessel? There’s got to be something informative in the journal.” I sounded a lot cooler and more aloof than I felt. In actuality, my fingers were twitching, anxious to devour the journal, to study every nuance of my father that could be culled from his writings. I wanted to know how he dotted his i’s, how he crossed his t’s. I wanted to know if there were long entries thinking about the daughter that he left behind; wanted to know if he wrote about my mother. My memories of her were fuzzy at best, the majority having been fed to me by my grandmother, who raised me after my mother’s passing.

Nina leafed through the journal. “We don’t even know why your father was searching for the Vessel.” Nina paused, cocked her head. “Sophie?”

I looked over my shoulder and Nina held the book open. I read the date—June 16, 1982. “That was eleven days before I was born.” I took the book from her, smoothed my palm over the image sketched on the page. “And that’s my mother.”

Nina came beside me. “Then that must be you.”

Lucas had drawn a very detailed sketch of my mother. She had the same slight smile on her face that I dreamed of. Her long, delicate curls were tied at the nape of her neck and her slim hands held the full swell of a very pregnant belly. Inside the round swell, Lucas had drawn a baby.

“I guess,” I said, trying my best to distance myself from my mother’s familiar eyes.

Nina flipped the page and I blinked. “You again,” she said.

Another baby drawing, this one me, without my mother.

“Why was he drawing pictures of me if he was just going to leave? Why was he drawing me in a journal that he used to log his searches for the Vessel?”

Alex squeezed my hand. “I don’t know, Lawson.”

Nina hugged me to her.

Alex looked from her to me. “I think the real question is—how did Ophelia end up with your father’s journal?”

I peeled Alex’s hand from mine and brushed my fingers through my hair, my eyes still fixed on the journal, on the sketch of me.

“Maybe you should sit down.” Nina’s cold hands pressing against my shoulders rattled me and I stepped away. “Maybe this journal will help answer some questions you have about your father, you know? It could be a good thing.” Nina tried to smile and I forced a nod.

“You know, I think I just need some air,” I said.

“That’s a good idea,” Alex said. “We can go for a walk.”

“Actually, I think I’d like to be alone right now.” I pulled my keys from the ring by the door. “I’m just going to go for a drive.”

I went down to the underground garage and slipped behind the wheel of my new-to-me ’91 Honda Accord. I’d always considered myself more of a rough-and-tumble SUV kind of girl, but since I’d written “My CRV was peeled open like a tin can by a power-crazed wannabe mystic” on my auto policy form—well, eyebrows at my insurance company were raised. After that, I figured a fairly nondescript sedan was a good way to go for a replacement car.

I sunk into my seat and practiced a little bit of deep breathing, determined not to cry. Or scream, or punch the steering wheel, or yell profanities to a man whom I’d never known and who would never hear them. Instead, I turned on the radio and pulled out of the garage into the inky black night, humming along to some throbbing new Lady Gaga beat.

The gentle flow of post-rush-hour traffic went to an immediate, brake-squealing stop-and-go when the sky opened up and started to dump quarter-sized raindrops onto the cement. I groaned and pulled around a soccer mom in an SUV the size of my apartment, angling onto the 280 Freeway exit. I had no idea where I was going, but according to the blurry green freeway sign, I was on my way south to San Jose.

I flipped on my headlights and thought about my father, thought about his careful script in the yellowing pages of the old notebook.

Nina was right; there could be things in that journal that answered my questions about him. If I knew enough about him to have questions.

As a little girl I imagined him tall and slim with a dashing career that kept him out of my life—perhaps a mild-mannered college professor by day, a continent-hopping James Bond type by night. He was supposed to want to be with me, to want to know his only daughter, but circumstances kept him at bay.

Now I knew what those circumstances were—greed. Power. My father wanted to find the Vessel of Souls. A Vessel that controlled the balance of good and evil in the world.

I wasn’t any use to him... .

The thought entered my head on its own and I felt a lump forming in my throat. I clenched my teeth and felt the leaden weight in my foot as I pressed the gas pedal harder, my little car zipping past the minivans and eco-conscious carpoolers.

He could have found me anytime... .

My eyes stung and I took my hands off the wheel, pressing them over my ears. Why was I doing this to myself? The car pulled a little to the left and I jerked it back, then stared at the road in front of me. Somewhere along my drive I had turned onto a deserted strip of highway. The fat raindrops had now turned into a sad, constant drizzle that thundered on the hood of my car. I wiped the tears that poured down my cheeks. I sniffed, then squinted as a pair of halogen headlights beamed in my rearview mirror. I frowned. We were the only two cars on the road, yet Mr. Bright Lights apparently felt honor bound to drive directly behind me.

“If you’re in such a hurry, go around!” I mumbled to the car’s reflection. “It’s not like there aren’t three other lanes to choose from.”

In response, the headlights drew closer, filling the interior of my car with a glaring blue-white light. I snapped on my blinker and coasted into the slow lane. As Mr. Bright Lights pulled even with me, I shot him a dirty look, but the interior of his black SUV was dark. All I could make out was a figure hunched in the driver’s seat.

“Jerk,” I muttered, my tears drying in my cheeks.

Mr. Bright Lights sped up again, showering a spray of water onto my windshield. I kicked my wipers onto high; with the first whoosh of water I saw the blurry glare of Mr. Bright Lights’s taillights, directly in front of me.

“Holy shit!” I screamed, slamming on my brakes and yanking the wheel. My heart hammered as my tires spun and slid helplessly on the wet road. I felt my seat belt tighten and cut across my chest as the dark scenery outside swirled into a blurry, circling mess. I felt the prickling heat of sweat on my upper lip and down my back, and I let out a gurgling, wailing cry until my car glided to a gentle stop, just inches from the highway retaining wall. With shaking hands I killed the engine and bit back the feeling of hot adrenaline as it roared through my body.

There was no sound except the drumming of rain on metal and the thundering beat of my heart. I peeled my aching hands from the steering wheel and gulped lungfuls of air, waiting impatiently for the imminent post-traumatic-experience heart attack. When it didn’t come I clicked off my seat belt and pressed my forehead against the cool window glass, my gaze sweeping over the desolate highway. Mr. Bright Lights was long gone.

I looked at the cement wall a hairbreadth from my car and realized that I could have been gone, too. Gone—dead.

The tears started to pool again and I rested my head on my steering wheel, crying until my heartbeat had resumed its normal, steady beat, until I was numb to the horror of a complete stranger in an SUV trying to kill me on a deserted stretch of San Francisco highway.

I started my car and exited the freeway, turning around and heading home. My arms felt as though I had just completed a marathon workout session; it felt like it took hours to drive the eleven miles back to my apartment. I don’t think I took a breath until my car was parked in my designated spot and my feet were back on solid ground.

“My God, what happened to you? You look horrible!” Nina shrieked when I pushed open the apartment door.

I watched Alex give her an annoyed look, gently flicking her shoulder. “I mean, are you feeling better?” she corrected with a forced smile.

I dumped my sweatshirt on the floor and flopped onto the couch, Nina and Alex surrounding me, looking concerned but confused.

“Look, Lawson,” Alex started, taking his hand in mine. “This thing about your dad ... well, we don’t know for sure that he was hunting the Vessel. Or why.”

I pulled my hand away from his. “It’s not that—at least not right now.” I looked from Alex’s cobalt eyes to Nina’s coal-black ones. “Someone just tried to kill me!”

Nina frowned, halfway through tucking a fuzzy pink blanket over my shoulders. “Again?”

I ignored her. “On 280. I was driving ... thinking ... and this guy slammed on his brakes right in front of me! I spun out and almost hit the wall. I was this close,” I held my thumb and forefinger a miniscule distance apart. “And then he just drove away. I guess he thought he accomplished his mission.” I felt my lower lip pop out crybaby style.

Nina looked slightly skeptical. “His mission being to kill you?”

I nodded, feeling the familiar lump in my throat. My eyes searched Alex’s. “Why does everyone want to kill me?”

“No one wants to kill you,” Alex said, rubbing my arm.

“Right,” Nina agreed, rubbing my other arm. “You know that most people have no idea how to drive. He probably didn’t even notice you were on the road.”

I shook away from both their patronizing arm rubs. “I was the only person on the road!” I snapped. “He knew I was there. He saw me. He looked directly at me—he glared at me.”

Alex sat back. “He glared at you? You saw him? What did he look like?”

I bit my lip. “Well, it was dark, so I couldn’t really see his expression that clearly. Or him. But I could feel he was glaring at me.”

“Through his car window.”

“Yes,” I said solemnly.

“In the dark.”

I nodded again.

Nina snorted, her effort to quell her laughter failing miserably. “I’m sorry!” she said.

I watched Alex’s bent head as he looked down; I watched the gentle vibration of his shoulders as he laughed silently. “Thank you both for your heartfelt concern.” I kicked the blanket off me and stood up, hands on hips. “Please remember it when you’re scraping me off two-eighty.”

I started to stomp toward my bedroom when I felt Alex’s soft hand on my shoulder. He squeezed gently and pulled me toward him, curling me into his chest. I kept my stern, angry composure for all of a millisecond while I melted into his warm, firm curves, while his arms slid around me, hands resting at the small of my back. Alex inclined his head so the tip of his chin brushed against my nose. His familiar cocoa-bean and cut-grass scent comforted me and I tried to remind myself that it was the safety of a trusted friend that was warming my heart; that the slow, delicious churning in my stomach had nothing to do with the way his body molded so perfectly against my curves. I stiffened immediately when I felt the hard coldness of Nina pressing up against me, her arms splayed in group-hug format, her head resting on my shoulder. “This moment is just so beautiful,” she murmured.

I broke away from our threesome and stared at Nina.

“You know, I think I am going to take this warm, fuzzy feeling outside.” She grabbed her purse and disappeared out the door, leaving Alex and I alone together in the silent apartment. We were still in a loose hug. I flushed and Alex straightened, then smiled. He pulled me close.

“This feels good,” he murmured.

I wanted to resist, but his arms around me were like warm chocolate. “It does,” I said finally.

“Look, Lawson, I—” Alex looked down at me and his cobalt eyes were deep, and soft. He licked his lips. “I just couldn’t take it if anything ever happened to you.”

I smiled. “I think I’ve proven I’m pretty resilient.”

Alex’s lips pushed up into his trademark half-smile and my stomach fluttered. He brushed my bangs from my forehead. “That, you have.” Alex leaned close to me, his soft curls lolling over his forehead. I drank in his warm scent and rolled up on my toes as his arms tightened around my waist, his lips brushed against mine, and then he was kissing me.

My head spun in delicious chaos as Alex’s palms caressed my back and he kissed and nibbled my lips, my ears, my neck. My heart thumped and I started to lose my breath and Alex broke away, raking a hand through his hair. His curls resettled in that perfectly tousled way.

“I should go,” he said quickly.

I looked at him, deflated, rejected. “Oh. Okay.”

He took my hand, squeezed it softly. His eyes were warm, sad. “I’m sorry, I just—I need to go.”

I hugged my arms to my chest, forced a smile. “Hey, no problem. Thanks for the information. I should go to bed now anyway.”

“That’s a good idea. We can take this up tomorrow.” Alex strode to the dining room table, began unzipping his backpack and stacking the books to go inside.

“Alex,” I started, once his back was to me. “What’s it like?”

He turned slowly. “What’s what like?”

I studied the carpet. “Heaven.”

The slow smile of memory spread across his lips, but his eyes were far away. “I can’t describe it.”

I sat down at the table and Alex followed suit. “Why?” I asked. “Are you not allowed or something?”

Alex slowly wagged his head from side to side and then looked at me. “There are no words.”

“Do you miss it?” I asked, my voice sounding small. “So you miss Heaven?”

Alex slid the leftover Chinese food boxes closer to him and plucked out a fortune cookie. He broke it, popped a piece in his mouth, and chewed thoughtfully. “Of course. It’s home. It’s all I’ve known for”—he shrugged, swallowed—“forever.”

“Oh.” I picked at a glob of solid grease on the dining-room table. “Is there anything you like about being here?”

One corner of Alex’s mouth turned up into a wry grin. “I like you.”

I blushed, went back to studying my table. “Thanks.”

“And the food.” Alex pushed the last bit of fortune cookie into his mouth. “I absolutely love the food. We didn’t have Chinese takeout like this when I was there last.”

I crumpled up a napkin and threw it across the table at him. He started sliding the books into his pack again until I put my hand flat on the table, pinning a single volume under my palm. “I’m keeping this one,” I said, my eyes firm and holding his.

Alex looked at the book. “You don’t need to ...”

I picked up my father’s journal and held it against my chest. “Yes, I do.”